Forever Tomorrow
by m.march
Summary: 'He stopped near the front door when he heard that name, when he breathed deep that heavy stench of death that lingered in the once safe walls of his home. If his heart beat it might have stopped.' EdwardxOC, dark themes but always a romance at the core.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: I do not own twilight, but I do love having to say that like anyone here might have thought otherwise.

Same universe, no Bella, EdwardxOC, the rest of the couples are canon.

Lots of adult themes, including but not limited to: abuse, sex, violence, and foul language. Enjoy!

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Before he reached the house he could feel the wrongness. The stillness, the smell of death, and the mangled rush of his family's thoughts into jumbled words, panics and names. His own being one of the majors tossed about in old minds. 'Edward's here. What will he say? How do I explain this? Stop thinking!' It was Alice. She was always panicking but it wasn't like her not to know what to do. And then he heard the other name, whispered in other minds that all seemed to be standing in the dining room. 'Vera.'

He stopped near the front door when he heard that name, when he breathed deep that heavy stench of death that lingered in the once safe walls of his home. If his heart beat it might have stopped. A second later he was standing in the dining room. He had wanted to stay calm, wanted not to care, but there she was- or what was left of her- laid out on the dining table. Of all the places, how could they put her there?

"What have you done?" He hissed, not even sure who it was aimed at. Her dark hair was tangled in filth, her face bloody and distorted by swollen flesh and mashed bones. Her lips were parted, blood crusted in their corners. There was no heartbeat, no breath, no warmth. Her arm was broken, bent grotesquely and leaving her pale hand to dangle off the edge of the large table. Her clothes were torn and he could tell where they had been pulled into place again to cover the parts of her that should never have been exposed. There was some awful relief beneath the wave of crippling rage. It wasn't his family. Edward could have understood with time if one of his clan had slipped up and she had been in the wrong place at the wrong time, if they had drained her of blood and life. But his brother's would never have raped her, would never have beaten her with such brutality.

"We found her." Alice spoke, he wasn't even sure whether it was aloud or in her thoughts. "I saw it but it was too late."

He stood tense as he listened carefully. Four men, gone by the time she and Jasper reached the spot. "Why would you see her future anyway?" Edward tried to sound cold, but his voice begged to break either with rage or misery.

"I was keeping an eye on her." Alice admitted, sounding ashamed of her obvious failure. "She was important to you."

His chest hurt at the sadness in her voice and now more than ever she was his sister. "I didn't even know her."

"You watched her at school." Alice persisted, Jasper rubbing her arm gently either to sooth her or keep her from approaching her brother. "We've all noticed. You even took that art class just to be closer, just to watch her longer."

His jaw ticked, but he wouldn't admit it. If he hadn't been willing before, he certainly wasn't going to say it now. Carlisle was standing nearest to the table but on the other side, his eyes downcast and his face grave. Esme looked like she was going to cry, pressed into the corner of the kitchen and watching him. "Where are Em and Rosalie?" Edward spoke but he was still staring at the girl on the table.

"Hunting the men that did this." Jasper said quietly, he was standing close to his wife and just barely blocking her from Edward in case things turned ugly. Sometimes it was hurtful that Jasper still couldn't always trust them, but on nights like this he understood why.

"They won't do anything unless you say so." Carlisle added.

Edward forced himself to harden like the stone he was. "What do I care?" He shook his head when Carlisle started to walk toward him, concern etched across his perfect features. "I didn't know her. Tell them to leave the humans and come home." He shivered as he forced himself to turn away from the table, from her body. His lips curled as he hissed at Alice. "Why would you bring the body here? You know what will happen if they find us with it!" It was so much easier to be angry.

Jasper bared his teeth, sliding easily into that space between his brother and his wife. Alice was grabbing at his shoulder to glare pleadingly at Edward. "I didn't think you'd want me to leave her there like that on some dirt road. I thought you'd want to see her, say goodbye, something…"

"You thought wrong Alice." He hissed before walking away. His legs had never wanted to buckle more, but he made it out of the house. It wasn't true, that he didn't know Vera, he knew her plenty- it was just that she had never known him. He knew the way she shied away from large groups, how she would lose time when painting in those dingy art classes, how she smiled during a thunder storm but sulked when it was too windy. He knew how she wished that she could play the piano, how she would sit at the shabby one in the music room when no one was around and place her fingers on the keys- how her headphones would fill her head with the sound of the notes but she would never bring herself to press down.

He had watched and dreamed in a way that he never had before, but he knew his rule well enough to leave it at that. No humans. He couldn't do that to another person, couldn't be the cause of that misery whether it was the death or the longing to be.

From his distance in the trees he saw Emmett and Rosalie arrive home. Both paused at the front door, looking back at him. He listened and heard the names of scumbags unfold in Emmett's head, along with street names and an address. It was a small blessing to be understood by his family in the case of Em, and a curse in the case of Alice.

He took off into the forest, the image of her ruined body dancing in his head just beside those sweet ones of her fingers hovering over tarnished keys. How long had it been since he killed someone? Would they still have her stolen scent on them? Would he feel any better after they were dead?

Alice sighed and stared at the body on the table. She had had such hopes for her, for the happiness of her brother.

"What should we do with her?" Esme whispered.

Carlisle reached out for his wife and ushered her toward the stairs. "Leave her here for now. I have a feeling he'll want to say goodbye when he's alone. We'll deal with the rest in the morning."

Darkness only got darker as evening set into midnight. Lightning streaked the sky as though to give desperate shreds of light to the black. When thunder cracked, the body on the table convulsed. But no one was around to see it. Rain was pouring down outside when Vera's eyes burst open. Bruises had already faded, along with scrapes and cuts. She saw the strange ceiling, the odd walls and tall windows. Her ribs cracked back into their rightful places, forcing her to bite back a scream as she rolled off of the table. A dining room table. Vera shuddered at the idea, gasping when her knees and palms hit the floor. One of her arms gave way with the sickly snapping of already cracked bones.

She screamed. She hadn't meant to, hadn't really been able to think. But then there she was, faster than any human could be- Rosalie. Vera looked up, lips still blood crusted and parted to swallow at air, tears streaming down her face. The blond that stood over her looked completely horrified, and sadly, horror of any kind came wrapped in anger for that particular vampire.

"What are you?" Rose snarled, shoulders drawn back as she looked at the girl on the floor with sharp eyes.

"Babe?" Emmett had come into the room, his body lurching to a stop as he too saw the now living girl. "What the-"

Vera sucked a breath and forced herself to her feet, lunging for the backdoor. Rose hissed, too fast for her, those perfect cold fingers wrapping around Vera's neck and slamming her back against one of the tall windows. It cracked, spider webs running along the entire panel. "What are you?" The blond shouted this time and Vera could feel others moving in the house. That was when she realized fully whose house she was in. Tears streaked down her face as she gasped for air around that tight grip. It was her own fault for not running when she had the chance, before they found out what she was. She had known what they were, had known to keep her distance.

"Rose!" Esme screamed.

Emmett was beside the blond, his hand on her outstretched arm but he wasn't looking at the oddity pinned to the glass, no, his gaze was only for his wife. "Baby." He whispered, desperate to calm her. "Let her go."

"What is she?" Rosalie jerked Vera forward, the toes of her shoes scraping the floor. "What are you?" The blonde hissed in her face.

Vera shivered, it wasn't the first time she'd been captured by vampires. "I'm alive." She couldn't help herself, the words came up through the gravel of her throat, her eyes wild with pain. "What are you?"

It was a taunt, meant to dig deep. She couldn't say she was entirely surprised when the blond goddess slammed her to the glass again, this time the window shattered, throwing her body out into the rain. She rolled across the grass, over the yard and landed in a heap near the edge of the forest.

"Rosalie!" Esme cried, grabbing onto the blond before she could charge out into the rain.

Vera lay in the grass for the beat of thunder and then forced herself upright again. It was pointless running from vampires, she knew that. Even when she wasn't half dead, she was faster than a human, but never faster than a vampire. They always found her. Always. And always she would run anyway. She was in the midst of trees when the bone in her arm started cracking back into place again, sending screams from her throat and forcing her knees to buckle in the mud.

A leg hit her back, pushing her down flat before a hand rolled her over. The blond was straddling her suddenly, rage and rain still painting that face. Vera could hear others shouting at the vampire, but all she could watch was that fist rearing back, sharp knuckles aimed at her face. The same question poured from her lips and Vera shivered in the mud. All she could hope was that that fist could do the job, could finally put her down- but she knew it wouldn't, none before it ever had.

She didn't close her eyes when it fell, wanting to see this one coming because she was sure it'd kill her at least for a while. A hand came from nowhere and caught that seemingly delicate arm. The blond hissed but was pulled up from the ground and thrown to the side all too easily. Vera stared in shock as he stepped over her with one leg and roared at the other woman, the sound breaking through the forest like another roll of thunder. She blinked up through the rain to look at him, her heart pounding against the cage of her chest until her ribs ached.

Edward looked down at her, surprise and confusion playing across his features. She hadn't been turned. Just as surely as she had been dead hours ago, she was now alive. He watched the smallest miserable smile crawl over her lips before her eyes closed and her body collapsed into unconsciousness.

Alice and Jasper were waiting at the house when he carried her back, Esme following him from the yard and Emmett stayed in the woods to work his wife through her temper.

"How is this possible?" He whispered as he stepped back into the house.

Alice looked just as mesmerized as her mate, both staring at the girl in his arms. "I don't know." He heard their fruitless thoughts.

"I'm calling Carlisle." Esme said in a hushed tone as she went to the phone. He had left to take care of an emergency patient only an hour before. "Take her to the office. Alice, honey, clean her up."

He tensed when Alice stepped up to take the girl from his arms and instead of handing her over, he walked to the office, knowing that his sister would have to follow. The body he held was human, he was sure of it, it felt fragile and he could hear her pulse flowing to the rhythm of her heart. But it wasn't possible. Eventually Alice talked him into setting her down and leaving the room but he didn't go far- lingering in the main hall all night and exchanging brief words with his adoptive father as the man rushed home.

Vera woke with a start, but this time without the lightning or the pain. She stared at a different ceiling, florescent lights glaring with the sort of intensity only ever found in doctor's offices or dentists. She sat up slowly. Her hair was wet and she was wearing scrubs. Had someone bathed her? She shuddered at the idea, swinging her legs over the edge of the exam table. It was a doctor's office, a private one from what she could tell.

When she noticed Dr. Cullen sitting off to the side at the desk, looking over papers with a scrunched face, she sucked a breath and remembered where she was and who had found her out. He sat back and looked at her, as though they had been in the midst of a deep conversation. "You seem to be in perfect health, Ms. Holt."

She shivered but stayed where she was, sitting on the exam bed. He stood and she tightened her grip on the edge of the bed. She wanted to look for a door but couldn't bear the thought of looking away as he approached. "You could say that."

"I have a few questions, I hope you won't mind if I ask."

Vera sat rigid. Did she have a choice?

Edward was standing in the living room, staring down the corridor toward the office door.

"How could you not know there was something wrong with her?" Rose was standing nearest the stairs, Emmett looking tired but patient nearby. "Couldn't you hear her thoughts? All that time you spent staring at her and you couldn't bother to listen in a little?" She was still raging through her hush.

He understood her panic. Rosalie never liked being surprised and if she thought her family was threatened she was first to defend. They were usually good qualities.

"Can't you hear her thoughts?" Alice whispered, finding a kinder way to phrase her sisters inquiry.

"Of course." He stared at the hall and sighed. "Sometimes." Edward amended and felt his family staring at him. "I just thought she was quiet or…"

"Crazy?" Rose snapped.

Esme sighed.

"Jazz, can you still feel her?" Edward asked softly, the blond man was standing nearby at the gape of the hall, but with his back to it.

"Yes." He offered. "She isn't as afraid anymore, but there's something… defeated, about it."

"Is there anything different about her?" Alice asked her mate.

He hesitated and then answered carefully. "If I don't reach out, I can't feel her at all." Jasper admitted uneasily. "I should have noticed before but... I just thought she was calm."

Rosalie scoffed and Esme finally stood with a growl. "I think we're going to alarm her if we're crowding her like this. You two go upstairs." She waved off Rose and Emmett. It took some arguing but eventually the blond stormed off, her mate in her wake.

They all tensed when the office door opened and Carlisle slipped out, joining them in the living room. "Alice, can you get her some of your clothes. I don't want to send her home in scrubs."

The dark haired woman nodded and vanished.

"What is she?" Esme asked quietly, as though the question might be rude.

Carlisle took a moment to organize his thoughts and it was all Edward needed to shift uneasily. "She's immortal. But she doesn't need to feed, isn't dead at all."

Esme looked astonished. "How could we not have seen one like her before?"

"I wasn't even sure they really existed. The Volturi spoke of them, said they were the best of companions for vampires because…" His thoughts trailed and Edward curled his lips with a snarl and finished his father's sentence. "Because they're an endless fountain."

"But they were only a fairytale, a dream of theirs. I never thought they were real." Carlisle sighed and ran a hand through his hair.

Alice passed them as she returned to the office with an armful of clothing, including shoes.

"She's getting anxious again." Jasper whispered before shivering, his back tight to the wall as he looked around.

Edward moved closer to his brother. "What is it?"

"Trapped. I feel trapped." Jasper hissed as though he had been the one cornered. "She feels like we've caught her."

Esme moved closer to her husband, looking at him with those pleading eyes of hers, begging him to make it right. Carlisle stroked her cheek gently. "Alright. It's been a long night. Edward, can you drive her home?"

Edward turned around to look at his father. "But she knows what we are-"

"And we know what she is." Carlisle said with his unwavering calm. "Take her home, son?"

She thought it was a cruel trick when she got into the car, but soon enough he was sitting in the driver's seat and they were speeding through the night that edged on morning. It felt like hours that they didn't speak, her hand came up to stifle a yawn.

Edward glanced at her curiously, though his face wouldn't have given it away. "Do you sleep?"

Vera tensed when he spoke, focusing her eyes ahead on the road. "Sometimes."

"How old are you?" He asked, the speed of the car slowing to make her even more uneasy.

"Seventeen." She said. 'Seventy-two' slipped across her usually quiet thoughts.

He stroked the steering wheel with his thumb. "You live with your father?"

"Adoptive." She tensed and looked at him, her eyes wider. "He doesn't know. You don't have to…" Vera swallowed hard and forced her gaze forward again. "He doesn't know."

"What do you do when they realize you don't age?" Edward continued to probe, hopeful that more revealing truths would slip through her thoughts, though they seemed carefully quiet.

She didn't answer right away, seeming to be trying to decide whether or not to lie. "I usually get placed in a family and say that I'm fifteen. It gives me two or three years with them, and then I can pull a few on my own. Eventually I go to another State and start over again."

"How many times have you died?"

Vera smiled before she could help herself. "Today?" She joked but as soon as she realized that she had, her smile quickly vanished. "A few times, I guess." 'Too many.'

"You don't know the number?" He tried again, hearing her thoughts and wondering if she knew he could.

"Twenty or thirty." She said too quickly. 'This decade.' Her thoughts added darkly as though to mock herself. She definitely didn't know he could hear those, but it seemed that she needed prompting before he could catch something flowing through her calm.

Suddenly she tensed as they rounded a corner and started up a dirt road. "This is close enough." She looked at him and when their eyes met, she blanched. Even an immortal was afraid of him, and why wouldn't she be? She was breakable and full of what his kind loved most. She was prey that could heal, blood that could regenerate. She was the cup that would never empty, the toy that would never break. Looking at her now, her face so human but so comfortable in the shadows, he could see why she would hide, why she would be afraid of them. "I don't want to wake Jim."

He tried not to growl. "Jim?"

She was holding onto her seatbelt, trapped in his stare. "My adoptive father…"

The car slowed and stopped. He could see her house down the road, a shabby little place surrounded by trees and mud.

Vera undid her seatbelt but his hand grabbed hers before she could reach for the door handle and jump out of the car. She felt warm to him and he wondered if he felt cold to her. He could feel her pulse pick up, hear her heart throb with dread. "We aren't going to hurt you." He wanted to clarify that 'he' wouldn't hurt her, but somehow that felt too intimate. "But we'd like to know you better." She was still tense, so he let go of her hand, even though it pained him to do so.

She opened the door but waited on the edge of her seat when he spoke again.

"Can I pick you up for class tomorrow?"

"Do I have a choice?" Her voice was small, resigned to something grim.

He wanted to frown but resisted. "Of course."

She swallowed and got out of the car. "Then no." Vera paused, squeezing the cold metal of the doors edge. "But I'll see you in class." She added before closing it.

He watched her disappear down the street. She was fast, faster than any human could dream, and light on her feet. There was more than just immortality there. He stared at the house on the dark street long after she had slipped inside. She wasn't human, couldn't be ruined by him like that, and had a lifetime like his own behind her. For the first time in decades, he couldn't wait for class tomorrow.


	2. Sunburns

The first half of his day was anxiously filled with waiting. He wasn't particularly fond of waiting when there was something he actually sought. So he had spent the time reflecting on the things he wanted to ask and the few things that he knew. The longer the day went on the more he suspected that she had ditched all together, he would have left to find her wherever she was hiding, but in the hall he passed her fading scent. She was there, somewhere.

It took everything he had not to track her through the halls. He remembered Carlisle's words from last night. He had explained again what he knew of her kind. Stronger and faster than humans, with a life that could never be fully extinguished. They might have been gods if the vampire's hadn't existed. The stories were more like fairytales, because he imagined if any vampire were to find such a creatures, they would never tell another- for fear of having that endless fountain taken from them. Edward would never tell, but it wasn't because of her rejuvenating blood.

Edward had said that he understood and tried to leave the conversation, but Esme had entered, hesitantly touching his arm. 'Remember,' His mother had pleaded. 'whatever she is, she had a bad night.'

He stood in the gape of the cafeteria entrance, watching as it filled up with students, waiting to see her in that mess.

Hissing through his teeth, he realize she wasn't in the cafeteria, wasn't even close. He was ready to turn and find her, when his sister came up beside him. Her small arm hooked with his, pulling him into the lunch room with her mate close beside. He sighed but gave in, walking to their usual table. Rose and Em had stayed home today, the family had thought it the best tactic for making peace with Vera. "She's here. You have class with her later. You can wait." Alice said as she sat.

Reluctantly he joined. "Did she attend your morning class?"

Alice nodded and set about pretending to eat. "She did." Her lips tugged at the corners as if to frown. "Though she never looked at us and sat as far away as possible."

"She was afraid." Jasper consoled his mate and it sounded as though it were for the hundredth time.

So he waited through lunch and another two classes before finally reaching his last period. Even before he walked into the shabby art room, he knew she was there. He could hear her heart above all others, though it hummed quieter and calmer than any human. Still, he berated himself for not having noticed sooner that she wasn't like the rest. As soon as he walked in, his eyes had found her sitting near the window in front of an easel. Her hand stilled, charcoal between fingers and pressed to paper, but she didn't look up. He didn't like the way she tensed more and more the closer he got, but he couldn't stop himself from taking the seat beside hers at the back of the room.

He said his polite 'good afternoon' and watched her reply uneasily, eyes never leaving her board.

The class began, the teacher lecturing before finally cutting them loose to do as they will. The class was already sparse and nearly emptied when the students were allowed to take their easels out where they wanted. He watched her begin to sketch again, but saw the nervousness in her hand, the way she couldn't quiet lay the lines right and her mind never really focused on the paper. "I said I wasn't going to hurt you and I meant it." Edward spoke softly, just below the register where a human would hear him.

Was he testing her? Vera swallowed and lifted her chin. "You're not the first of your kind to say so and lie."

It was his turn to feel uneasy, his teeth clenched but he managed not to growl. He looked at a student that passed by them.

"You don't like to draw." Vera spoke this time and he was surprised. "Why did you take this class?"

"How do you know I don't like to draw?"

She smiled just a little and it made his whole day of waiting worth it.

"Alright. I hate it." Edward continued to watch her profile. "I took the class because I wanted to see more of you."

Her smile dropped, charcoal catching on the page again. "You knew?"

He studied the dark smudges on her fingers left by the piece she held. "No."

Vera turned to look at him. "Then why?"

Edward shrugged lightly but didn't answer. After a moment of quiet his expression darkened, his eyes moving up to meet with hers. "Last night," He started. "when Alice and Jasper found you on the street," She cringed and looked away and it made him want to retract his words but still he continued. "they were human. You're faster and stronger than most humans aren't you?"

She twisted the piece of charcoal in her fingers, staring blankly at the sketch in front of her. "Yes."

His frown deepened, his jaw twitching. He had found them last night when he thought her dead. The ones that had raped her still smelt of her body, and they all reeked of her blood. "Why didn't you run?" He saw the truth of that night in her corpse and their memories, why wasn't she more distraught? Why could he see her swallowing back emotions to pretend to sketch in class? Honestly, he had expected her not to show, to hide out in her house and make him struggle over the decision of how to talk to her, how to get closer

"I tried." It was barely a whisper.

"They were too fast?"

"No." She looked like she wanted to run, but kept her eyes on the large board of paper in front of her. "They knew who I was. If I ran that fast, if I was that strong…" He saw tears forming in her eyes but then never fell. "I don't like being found out. Things can get…worse."

"Worse than raped and beaten to death?" She cringed and he regretted the words, but there was something about the glazed look in her eyes when she spoke of it that made his chest hurt. It hit him hard. "This has happened before." He breathed the truth and watched her hold her breath, as though it would hide it better. He didn't want to push this subject anymore, not here, not like this. "What would they have said if they saw you tomorrow?"

Something dark and almost violent flashed over her eyes, sweeping aside the pain, to twist her lips up at the corners. "It's been my experience that men are relieved to find out they aren't murderers."

The teacher was walking back into the class, students steadily flowing back. "I guess." Edward turned forward again, watching her from the edge of his vision. "But they died murderers."

The charcoal broke against the paper, her heart slamming up into her throat. It dragged down with her hand, leaving a jagged black line. She was flushed when she turned to look at him. She wanted to think he was joking, but nothing about the stern profile of his face gave that impression. "Why would you do that?"

He was quiet for so long that she was sure he wouldn't answer. "After what they did to you…" His jaw twitched, but his eyes didn't meet hers. "They deserved it. They deserved worse."

There were more students filling the seats around them and yet she couldn't help but whisper in shock. "But your eyes…" She had known what that amber color meant, though she had only heard of it before she saw the Cullens. It was why she had stayed even when she saw them. They didn't feed on humans. How would they ever find out about her? She had been naïve. But his eyes hadn't turned red. Was he lying about killing those men? Trying to win her trust? He wouldn't be the first to play with her like a mouse.

His lips curled, she saw it from the corner of her eyes, and he ducked his head to hide his snarl from the other students. "I don't feed on humans anymore," He whispered so lowly that no human would hear, knowing now that she still could. "and even if I did, I would not have taken any part of them into me."

They sat quietly through the last five minutes of class before the final bell sounded and the students flooded out. She remained, slow with gathering her things and uncomfortable as he waited for her. He followed her from the class into the emptied hall, a step behind and to her right. He listened, wanting to hear something either from her mouth or her mind, but she gave nothing, her pace even and her heart pounding heavy with nerves.

Suddenly she stopped and he was surprised until he saw Alice and Jazz waiting up ahead in the hallway. She was trapped again, he didn't need to read his brother's thoughts to know that. "What do you want from me?" Vera asked, her voice low and defeated even when it wouldn't abandon some sense of dignity. Again, he couldn't believe he'd ever thought she were a seventeen year old human.

"Nothing." He said, watching her.

_Liar_, her thoughts whispered. "Then pretend you don't know. Nothing has changed."

He hesitated. It was a fair request but he couldn't imagine granting it. "I don't want to." Edward admitted.

She swallowed hard and sighed. "Why not?"

"I want to know you." He replied just as softly. "Allow me to spend time with you… to be your friend." He requested though even he knew that friendship was less than he desired but at the same time, he would gladly take it over pretending not to know her.

She laughed and it was short and alarmingly unhappy. "Friends?" Vera turned to look up at him in disbelief. "Our kind can't be friends any more than you can be friends with a human. I've seen the way you and your family suffer through classes surrounded by them. Do you think my blood wouldn't temp you the same way?"

"It doesn't." He protested and even though she was angry he felt grateful to hear her speak so much. "I wasn't interested in you because of your blood."

"Then why?" She demanded.

His lips pressed together because he could not answer, not after how he had seen her only the night before, broken and dead on his kitchen table. He couldn't tell her how she had intrigued him, how he'd thought about her, about how he couldn't have her because she was human. "I don't know." He lied.

She looked up the stretch of hall again only to realize that the other two vampires had vanished.

"May I drive you home?"

"No." She answered automatically, nervously. It was unnerving, not knowing what they wanted. She had been caught by vampires before and they'd stolen decades from her, locking her away and draining her down almost every day. If the Cullen's weren't going to use her, then why were they so interested? Were they toying with her?

Edward was still beside her when she reached the outside of the school. She paused, clutching tightly to the strap of her bag. "I'll see you tomorrow."

He took it as a promise and watched her leave. She walked home. It took everything he had not to follow but once he'd gone home with his car he went out and found himself trailing through the woods. The next few weeks were like that. She was quiet and distant, he sat next to her, he offered her a ride home and every day she declined. Some days were more polite than others. And every night he ended up in the woods outside her home, content to know that she was there inside.

It seemed her adoptive father was a truck driver. Edward saw him leave the second day and he hadn't been back. Some nights she didn't sleep and when she did it wasn't long. She never seemed to eat at school and he hadn't seen her go to the grocery store in those weeks.

It was raining outside and he couldn't help but notice how much calmer she seemed, almost smiling when thunder rolled over the teachers attempts at a lecture. They were sketching fruit today. It was boring but he didn't care. It seemed every day he found himself waiting for this class, for this chance at awkward bits of conversation.

Most of what he learned about her had been the rare words that slipped across her consciousness but some days, when she seemed more uneasy than others, he didn't ask anything at all.

It was still raining out when class ended that day. He walked her to the entrance of the school. At some point it had become 'walking with her' rather than 'near her'. "May I drive you home?" He asked every day, and every day she declined.

This time she didn't seem anxious so much as she was disappointed. "No, thank you." Her attention returned to the heavy rain and the thick clouds. Did she want to walk? Was that why she always said no? He opened the door for her and the sound of the weather was louder than even the students in their class had been. "May I walk you?"

Vera was only a few steps from the door when he asked, looking back at him curiously. There was her moment of hesitation, that worry that life had taught her. 'Say yes.' He heard her think, urging herself and it took all his effort not to smile and sigh at that bit of encouragement. "What about your car?"

"I'll get it tomorrow." He said, leaving the door to swing shut as he walked her across the parking lot. Jasper and Alice were standing under an umbrella next to their car and though he only glanced at them for a moment he could see their smiles.

Vera didn't take the roads, he already knew that. She walked right through the woods, a straight line to her house that took her over rocks and fallen trees. She was elegant. She had pulled up the hood on her sweater, letting it soak through as well as her hair. She seemed so much calmer out here, away from other people, beneath the dark clouds.

"Do you get sick?" Edward asked curiously.

She was standing on a mossy ledge when she paused, thinking about that. "Yeah… but not small illnesses." She shrugged and started walking again. "I don't know how it works. I died of tuberculoses once though." He saw her mouth twitch after she said it and wondered if she hadn't meant to give out that information. "I don't suppose vampire ever get sick." She muttered, trying to change the subject.

He smiled at the thought. "No." Lightning flashed somewhere to the side and soon the thunder clapped again. He heard her appreciative sigh. "Do you live up here for the weather?"

Vera smiled a little. "I guess in part."

"What's the other reason?" He asked but she didn't seem to answer at first. "I would think you'd want to live somewhere… sunnier."

Her fingers were curling around the strap of her bag again, something she did when she was uncomfortable.

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to-"

"I tried to live in sunnier places so that they wouldn't find me."

He clenched his teeth. 'They' had meant vampires, ones she'd learned to fear.

She smiled a little and kept walking. "But I get tired if I'm exposed to direct sunlight for too long." She laughed, a small embarrassed sort of sound. "I tried to go through a desert in Nevada once." She shook her head. "I couldn't move during the days, it was so damn bright, all I could do was sit there. I was as red as a lobster by night fall."

He smiled and came to walk beside her, they were coming up on her house now. "You sunburn?" He tried not to laugh.

She nodded, still smiling. "Stupid right? I mean, I healed over the night but by the next morning I was pale and ready to burn again." She stopped near the porch and looked up at him. "Sparkling doesn't seem so bad now, right?"

Edward lifted and dropped one shoulder in a shrug. "Somehow sunburns might have more dignity than sparkling?"

There was an awkward moment where she seemed to consider inviting him in and then decided against it. He took a step back. "I'll see you tomorrow?"

Vera nodded, relief washing through her as she stepped up onto her porch and he started toward the main road. Tomorrow.


End file.
